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Audio Teachings and Resources

DHARMA TALKS

IT GETS BETTER: THE RADICAL PATH OF BEFRIENDING OURSELVES FOR TEENS

Many of us have grown up not really getting a lot of positive encouragement that helps us to learn how to develop basic kindness for ourselves. Of all the people we will treat the worst in our lives, we end up treating ourselves the worst. With the practice of using mindfulness to cultivate self-kindness, we begin to emerge from various kinds of self harm and begin benefiting others around us. We may start in a lot of suffering, yet we can move into a space of being happier and more in-tuned with others around us. In this talk offered for teen mindfulness retreatants, Lama Rod points out the fundamental elements of self-kindness that can directly contribute to authentically befriending both our selves and others around us.

RADICAL DHARMA IN TIMES OF CRISIS

Lama Rod Owens, co-author of Radical Dharma, leads an evening based on the book, which explains how the legacy of racial injustice plays out in society at large and Buddhist communities in particular. This urgent call to action outlines a New Dharma that considers the ways that racism and privilege prevent our collective awakening.

WHEN THE GURU PASSES

A reflection of my relationship with my teacher exploring the teacher/student relationship and the importance of this relationship in our attempt to be free.

Part 2 of 3 of Lama Rod Owens's visit to Windhorse IMH, Northampton. Lama Rod sits with the Windhorse staff and guides us through unpacking boundaries and the emotional receptiveness and intelligence of the body.

Part 3 of 3 of Lama Rod Owens's visit to Windhorse IMH, Northampton. Lama Rod sits with the Windhorse staff and guides us through unpacking boundaries and the emotional receptiveness and intelligence of the body.

WHEN THE TEACHER FUCKS UP: PART ONE

How do we began to make sense of the hurt we experience when our teachers cross boundaries? How do we hold our belief in the teacher's realization in dialogue with the reality of the humanity of the teacher? In this talk first offered in April of 2017, I speak of my relationship to my teachers and how I have attempted to make sense of realization and ignorance and the development of wisdom in the face of this duality.

WHEN THE TEACHER FUCKS UP: PART TWO

Continuing where I left off in part 1, I explore some textual resources connected to how the teacher is traditionally understood. I also share some of my personal experiences with my teachers.

TALKING DHARMA, THEOLOGY, AND THE QUEER DIVINE

The Satipatthana is the 4 Foundations of Mindfulness offered by the Buddha, which established the practice of contemporary mindfulness. Sati can be translated as remembering. The practice of queer divinity is about remembering our ourselves including our bodies, our sexuality, our gender identification, our history, traumas, lovers, and all the ways we use our bodies to engage in pleasure. It is also remembering our ancestors. It is evoking the ancestral presence of transgender women of color at the Stonewall Inn who initiated the modern gay rights movement. It is remembering all of our would-be elders who lost their lives to the AIDS Epidemic. It is remembering the countless people who never had a chance to live out their deepest wishes to be loved and love in the way they choose. It is remembering that heaven and enlightenment can be experienced on earth in this body. In the talk offered at the 2017 Wild Goose Festival, I explored my relationship to the queer divine through the dual lenses of dharma and theology.

PRAYER, GRIEF, AND ACTIVISM

So many of us are grieving and in deep mourning for the suffering that we are perceiving in the world as well in our own situations. We do not live in a society that is comfortable with our open grieving, which includes our tears and the very messy ways that grieving takes us. Community based grieving is healing and transformative. When we combine community grieving with community prayer, then we are able to better transform our grief into wisdom and joy. This community dharma talk offered to the Radical Dharma Boston Collective explores the practices of prayer, community grieving and open awareness meditation in dialogue with our work as activists.

THE SUFFERING OF BEING MEAN

There is so much meanness happening. This meanness doesn’t spring from people’s overt wish to harm others, but it can be traced back to the struggle many of us face in dealing with our own suffering. Without awareness and compassion, our attempts to work with our own basic discomfort will be messy and unskillful. The work to love and care for ourselves will give permission for others to do the same work for themselves.

HOME, LOVE, AND THE IDEA OF ANCESTRY

When the Buddha offered the first Noble Truth, he articulated the most inescapable aspect of our existence as human beings, which was that discomfort is a basic part of our experience. It is only by accepting this reality can we begin the work of liberation from the causes and conditions of suffering. Yet there are many methods to accomplish this goal. Some of these methods are related to our relative identity locations. This dharma talk explores our relationship to home and the the experience of home in our bodies, its dependence on love, as well how this could be related to ancestor practice.

BROKEN HEARTS AND NOBLE TRUTHS: REFLECTING ON THE ELECTION, OCCUPATION, AND RESILIENCY

The 4 Noble Truths were the first teachings offered by the Buddha to explain the presence of suffering, its root cause, and a proclamation of a methodology of liberation. In this talk for the Love Circle Sangha, Lama Rod explores the wisdom of the 4 Noble Truths as a road map to make sense of the recent election, the coming of intensified hate and disunity as well as tool for active resiliency grounded in radical presence or authentic vulnerability.

TALKING AND PRACTICING BLACK LIBERATION THEOLOGY AND RADICAL DHARMA

Whether we are talking Black Liberation Theology or Radical Dharma, we are talking about socially liberating beliefs and practices that privilege a development of fundamental love for what we have been taught is unlovable. In this talk at the Open Church of Maryland, Lama Rod explores the profound and revolutionary practices of love as a tool for marginalized people to achieve both social and spiritual liberation that is rooted in the liberatory theology and dharma traditions.

REMEMBERING THE QUEER DIVINE- HARVARD MEMORIAL CHURCH

What does the Queer Divine look like? How is it expressed? How is it experienced? In what ways is it revolutionary? In this sermon/talk at Harvard University's Memorial Church, Lama Rod explores the Queer Divine through Queer Theology and Queer Dharma.

PRACTICING MEDICINE BUDDHA IN TIMES OF VIOLENCEMedicine Buddha attained enlightenment through the development and maturation of an ethic of healing that addressed the totality of relative suffering of all beings from sickness to political and social oppression. But how can we use this profound wisdom found in Medicine Buddha’s mythology to address the oppression and violence many of us experience today?

WE ARE THE VIOLENT ONES

We talk about how violent the world is becoming but how do we relate to violence that we see and experience around us? What about the violence that expresses itself in our experience? How can we use the tools and strategies of Buddhadharma to examine the ways we create harm for ourselves and others.

COMING OUT, VIOLENCE, AND THE PROBLEM OF SAMSARA

How do we continue to work with the truth of interdependence or interrelatedness as we confront daily acts of violence? How do we continue to see dharma as a strategy of truth telling, vulnerability, and transparency? How do we find refuge in sacred spaces that are all too often violated? These are a few of the questions explored in this dharma talk.

Perhaps one of the most challenging aspects of spiritual practice is the embracing of our sexuality and sexual expressions. Many of us have deeply internalized shame of our sexual selves. So much of our sexual selves is connected to the physical body. What we discover is a poignant fear of our own bodies as vessels of our sexual expression. How do we interrogate this shame through practices of mindfulness, lovingkindness, and self-compassion? Yet beyond that, how can we practice wisdom and make intelligent choices to enjoy our bodies and the bodies of others in ways that do not reproduce psychic harm for ourselves or others? Being “Spiritual” does not mean we give up sex or cruising our favorite apps like Tinder or Grindr. Nor do we have to depart from communities of transgressive sexual practices that for many of us have been liberating. What being a spiritual person means is that our choices and practices are rooted in love and compassion. This is an open, frank, and hopefully shame-free exploration of exploring the sexual divine.

INTRODUCTION TO TONGLEN: TAKING AND SENDING FOR SELF

Tonglen means taking and sending. It is a profound practice that helps dissolve the barriers that separate ourselves from others. It is a practice that helps us to hold the space for the suffering we encounter in our experiences as well as the experiences of others.

HEALING THROUGH THE DHARMA: PARTS 1 & 2

We often struggle to work with the trauma that is so present in our lives. We are bombarded and overwhelmed with a world that seems to be falling part. We are confronted with the concerns about our natural environment as well as social problems such as racism, poverty, war, violence, and a host of other things. We are left with a trauma that is unexamined and which affects the quality of our lives and our interpersonal interactions. How do we begin to work with this kind of trauma in our personal experience and within our sanghas with the help of our dharma practice? How can we cultivate the space, willingness, and courage to authentically show up with our woundedness within a safe space in order to heal? These are the questions explored in this dharma teaching.

VIDEOS

Lama Rod Owens, one of the emerging leaders in his generation of Buddhist teachers, spoke about his practice of Buddhism and introduced the Buddhist concepts of Tara and Tantra.

Lama Rod Owens speaks at the London Shambhala Meditation Centre on November 7th 2018 about the impacts of sexual misconduct in spiritual communities. His talk explores the reality of the teacher/student relationship, power/hierarchy, patriarchy/misogyny, enabling violence, emotional trauma, compassion, love, and accountability, grieving, and creating safe spaces after the revelations of abuse.

In this talk offered at the Rime Buddhist Center and Monastery in Kansas City, MO, Lama Rod explores the cultural phenomenon of hate and extremism through the lens of the Buddhist perspective of pain and suffering.

In this talk Lama Justin and Lama Rod explore the resent sexual misconduct controversies and allegations occurring in several important sanghas while bringing the same issues of misconduct into conversation with prevalent systems of dominance, which includes patriarchy, racism, ableism, class, and others. They also explore male cisgender privilege, financial ethics, white supremacy, anti-blackness in Tibetan Buddhism, angry white men, identity politics, pissing people off, and the apocalypse. They also offer insight into the what the guru is and how it may or may not be problematic within western buddhist culture. ***Trigger warning: This is a very frank and direct conversation with dialogue exploring rape culture and violent acts within Buddhist sanghas.***

Southsea Sangha presents: Dharma Den w/Lama Rod Owens Community Dharma Leader, Daniel sits down with activist, author and dharma teacher, Lama Rod Owens for a chat, at the end of Lama Rod's first European teaching tour, to chew the dharma fat. Things they discussed included Race and Whiteness, Queerness, Patriarchy, Spiritual Bypass and of course The Queen!

Working with Sexual Misconduct in the Shambhala Community: Part 1 Lama Rod presents from the Atlanta Shambhala Center exploring the impacts of sexual misconduct in spiritual communities and offering support to the local and greater Shambhala community as it comes to terms with recent revelations concerning the behavior of the Sakyong. Lama Rod explores the reality of the teacher/student relationship, power/hierarchy, patriarchy/misogyny, enabling violence, emotional trauma, compassion, love, and accountability, grieving, and creating safe spaces after the revelations of abuse.

Working with Sexual Misconduct in the Shambhala Community: Part 2 Lama Rod presents from the Atlanta Shambhala Center exploring the impacts of sexual misconduct in spiritual communities and offering support to the local and greater Shambhala community as it comes to terms with recent revelations concerning the behavior of the Sakyong. Lama Rod explores the reality of the teacher/student relationship, power/hierarchy, patriarchy/misogyny, enabling violence, emotional trauma, compassion, love, and accountability, grieving, and creating safe spaces after the revelations of abuse.

Lama Rod Owens, co-author of "Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love & Liberation," speaks at the London Shambhala Meditation Centre on April 2018 as part of his European tour.

The Radical Dharma of #metoo. The Radical Dharma team gets in the conversation that’s directly confronting sexual misconduct, harassment, violence and the conflicting emotions that normalize them. Time to call in and up: No more can students, teachers, and leaders of social justice, healing justice, buddhist, yoga and other spiritually-based communities hide from sexual indiscretion, coercion and outright abuse. We can no longer confront and hold accountable the transgressions without holding the cultures that created them accountable too!

Frederick P. Lenz Foundation Distinguished Guest Lecturer 2018 - Lama Rod Owens is an author, activist, and authorized Lama (Buddhist Teacher) in the Kagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism. Lama Rod is a founding teacher of the Bhumisparsha Sangha, a teacher with Inward Bound Mindfulness Education (iBme), a visiting teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship and the Brooklyn Zen Center. This is the complete video from Lama Rod's public talk on happiness.

Frederick P. Lenz Foundation Distinguished Guest Lecturer 2018 - Lama Rod Owens is an author, activist, and authorized Lama (Buddhist Teacher) in the Kagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism. Lama Rod is a founding teacher of the Bhumisparsha Sangha, a teacher with Inward Bound Mindfulness Education (iBme), a visiting teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship and the Brooklyn Zen Center. This is the complete video from Lama Rod's public talk on love and rage.

Frederick P. Lenz Foundation Distinguished Guest Lecturer 2018 - Lama Rod Owens is an author, activist, and authorized Lama (Buddhist Teacher) in the Kagyu School of Tibetan Buddhism. Lama Rod is a founding teacher of the Bhumisparsha Sangha, a teacher with Inward Bound Mindfulness Education (iBme), a visiting teacher with Natural Dharma Fellowship and the Brooklyn Zen Center. This is a short clip from Lama Rod's public talk on love and rage.

Bhumisparsha is a Buddhist online sangha (spiritual community) founded by Lama Rod Owens and Lama Justin von Bujdoss. Our community is committed to the presentation of vajrayana, or tantric Buddhism, in a way that has relevance, depth and meaning in an ever-changing, multicultural world. We are also committed to bridging spiritual practice and social change.

In this session, Lama Rod guides participants through a grounding embodiment meditation practice which leads into awareness of emotions practice. Lama Rod continues dialoguing about the important of pain and suffering while exploring submitted questions about authenticity, activism, radical self-care, working with identity, and other questions.

Recording from November 2017 webinar exploring ethical misconduct from teacher to students facilitated by Lama Rod Owens and Lama Justin Von Bujdoss. Find answers to questions sent in after the webinar at buff.ly/2z6i411. Lama Rod and Lama Justin hope that this work benefits all beings and continues the dialogue in our spiritual communities. They hope to see more voices speaking out and offering support. They would also like to highlight the work of SNAP (Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests). The organization is also open to supporting Buddhists and more info can be found in the Q&A document cited above as well as visiting buff.ly/2BH7Qai.

It's hard not to be triggered right now. Between the instability of 45, natural disasters around the world, the threat of our health care being taken away on top of professional athletes becoming the new face of social change, it's hard to find some peace without anxiety. Actually, its hard not to be pissed, afraid, and overwhelmed. Lama Justin and Lama Rod explore how to apply dharma practice in a very frank and basic way to our current struggles. (Trigger warning: 90s hip hop is gratuitously praised.)

In this episode of the Waking Up Bipolar podcast, Chris Cole speaks with Lama Rod Owens exploring the issue of spiritual practice, identity, and mental illness. Lama Rod is a formally trained Buddhist teacher, Harvard Master of Divinity graduate, and co-author of Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love, and Liberation. Lama Rod works to be as open, honest and vulnerable as possible and help others do the same, including discussing his journey with depression.

Justin Von Bujdoss (Repa Dorje Odzer) and Lama Rod Owens discuss the root of sexual misconduct and white supremacy uprising in Charlottesville as it relates to the core issue of power and hierarchy and how these issues further relate to violence in American Buddhist communities.

We live in difficult times. War and violence, racism and hatred, and socioeconomic and environmental concerns have left many of us fatigued and fearful. What practices and strategies can we summon from the dharma to aid us in facing the chaos of the world? In this series of talks, Tibetan Buddhist teacher Lama Rod Owens draws on the Buddhist teachings to help us enact an ethic of healing, especially as activists or allies of such movements as Black Lives Matter or gay marriage, so that we can live boldly instead of lashing out or shutting down. Click to watch!

Join Susan Piver and Lama Rod as they explore the practice of resilience and love in the context of interpersonal relationships and politics.

Creativity isn’t confined to just our heads. For Lama Rod Owens, body concentration is a prompt that helps him write poetry and tap into instinct. “One of the things that really motivates me as an artist, as a poet, is this challenge and struggle to bring awareness to things that are so often considered ordinary or underwhelming,” Owens says in the video. “I think it is my personal effort to make the world more relevant . . . my poetry is an extension of that work.” Click here to watch!

Join Cafe con Cass host Cassandra and Lama Rod Owens as they talk about emotions, liberating ourselves and our communities while staying mindful and realistic about impact and accountability in healing work.

Join Lama Rod and Cafe host Cassandra as they explore trauma, activism, and the emergence of Radical Dharma.

LAMA ROD & REV. ANGEL IN DIALOGUE

Lama Rod Owens and angel Kyodo williams discuss the challenges of being teachers of color in predominantly white communities. Read their conversation in the Winter 2014 issue of Buddhadharma.

Podcasts

In the final episode of 2018, Ruby talks to Lama Rod Owens, co-author of the book Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love and Liberation, about the spiritual work of healing systemic racism. World events coupled with the advent of social media as a platform for the literal raising of consciousness, have helped this to emerge as the collective healing work of our times—as much a personal issue as it is a public and a political one.

As Ruby wrote in this piece for the site, Radical Dharma offers a powerful and compassionate perspective for anybody confused about their role in this—and is ESSENTIAL READING for anybody working in the healing, wellness or self-help space, or otherwise actively engaged in this work.

In the context of sexual misconduct in the Shambhala community, Lama Rod hosts a wide-ranging discussion about self-care, justice, trauma, race and white supremacy, and how our practice supports keeping it real.

Unconventional recipes for love and liberation. In a world filled with hate, injustice, and despair, our sense of shared humanity depends on learning to MAKE more love. Not find it, not fall into it. But intentionally create and wield it. Centering the voices of historically and culturally marginalized people, How To Make Love™ will provoke and challenge you to create your own recipe for and practice of making more love — in your life, and in the world — and ask you to include justice as a critical ingredient.

"This week I sit down with Lama Rod Owens to discuss the intersection of Buddhist Dharma and American culture and politics. Lama Rod articulates his vision for Radical Dharma: a call to make the teachings of Buddhism relevant for tending to the suffering in the United States in this day and age, starting with addressing issues of race, gender and sexuality in American Buddhist communities."

Episode 17- Lama Rod Owens: A Dialogue Between Love and Rage. “Dharma isn’t sexy, or glamorous for me…it’s just work. It’s discipline and work, and I do it because the fruit is spaciousness; this openness. Where I can just be with my life. That spaciousness is where liberation actually happens. Over the years of practice, you realize you’ve become a different person. You begin to trust yourself more because you’re always in tune with your experiences…and that is what I love. It just becomes very ordinary.” – Lama Rod Owens

"In today's Valentine's Day #WiseGirl chat, I sit down with Lama Rod Owens, co-author of Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love and Liberation. We address various issues that come up in mediation practice, and in life... how to love and live better, the role of vulnerability, agency and #MeToo, and how investigating our own suffering can help heal not only ourselves, but others too. Here's to loving well! Enjoy:)"

Lama Rod Owens joins us to speak about his new book Radical Dharma: Talking Race, Love, and Liberation.

In this episode we cover Lama Rod’s journey into Tibetan Buddhism, issues of race in American Buddhism, sexuality, his contemplative practice and his thoughts on sex education.

On this weeks episode of Multifaithful, Reka talks to Lama Rod Owens, renowned Dharma teacher and activist based in Boston. We discuss how mindfulness has inspired his involvement in various activist causes and how it can pave the way for a different kind of liberation.

This episode is a collaboration with Lama Rod Owens, one of the co-authors of 'Radical Dharma'. He brings his deep study and practice of the dharma into everyday life, and shares with me his reflections not just as a Buddhist, but as a Black queer man in America. In our conversation, Lama Rod brings it back again and again to the importance of doing our own work. He does not shy away from confronting the ways in which we sometimes use our experiences of marginalisation to avoid looking at how we are privileged. He also speaks strongly about how love galvanises us, rather than anger, but “our anger is actually pointing us to our woundedness”, which is to say, where we need to be doing the work of love.

PANELS

Join the conversation with 15 leading African American Buddhist teachers. This unprecedented public event brings together 15 leading Buddhist teachers of black African descent from across the country to talk about dharma, the state of the world, and what it means to be a black Buddhist in America today. This dialogue follows the conclusion of The Gathering, a historic meeting of Buddhist teachers of black African descent from many different Buddhist traditions.

This talk was a starting point in a long overdue discussion on mindfulness and sex. Movements such as #metoo have asked us to re-examine how we approach pleasure and consent in our sexual encounters and relationships. Our brilliant teachers addressed how mindfulness can guide us to a world where sexual enjoyment and mutual respect can lead to greater satisfaction and connection.

HBC BUDDHISM AND RACE CONFERENCE: WELCOME PANEL

The Buddhism and Race Conference organized by Harvard Buddhist Community at Harvard Divinity School addresses issues surrounding race and racism within the Buddhist community. Activists, sangha leaders, community members, and students join together to learn from one another and share justice-oriented teachings and training.

BUDDHISM & RACE IN AMERICA AT HARVARD DIVINITY SCHOOL

How do issues of race impact Buddhist communities? What can Buddhist communities do to address these issues in their own settings? During the HBC Conference on Buddhism and Race in America, panelists Harrison Blum, Bryan Mendiola, Lama Rod Owens, and Roshi Sings-Alone explore these questions in a conversation moderated by Christopher Raiche.